Professional Documents
Culture Documents
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Volume 1 Number 2
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Welcome to the second issue of RocketSTEM magazine. In this spring edition, we take you: Inside the life and research of an astronomer at the Green Bank Telescope. To the top of NASAs VAB for a view of a SpaceX launch. A first-hand account of being aboard Americas first space station, Skylab. Riding along in a Pave Hawk with the Air Forces 920th Rescue Wing. And much, much more. We welcome your comments and suggestions for how to improve the magazine, and are always open to adding new contributors for future issues. Please feel free to contact us via email at ideas@rocketstem.org with your feedback or story ideas. RocketSTEM is a non-profit media foundation devoted to promoting STEM education and space exploration. Our mission is to: Inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers and astronauts. Keep educators informed on space developments while helping them better incorporate STEM lessons into their classrooms. Raise awareness of the benefits of space exploration. This publication is available in a free digital version. It may be downloaded as PDF file, or viewed online at www.rocketstem.org.
An Atlas V rocket, carrying the SBIRS GEO-2 satellite, blasts off from LC-41 on March 19.
Photo: Sherry Valare
Contents 02 10 18 28 32 40
CURIOSITY
With the primary mission goal now accomplished, Curiosity gears up for more science.
Also Inside:
Opportunity At Work . . . 04 Rover Infographic . . . . . 06 Design Challenge . . . . . 08 Buying Telescopes . . . . . 14 Orion The Hunter . . . . . . 16 ISS At A Glance . . . . . . . 22 ISS Science Social . . . . . 24 Yuris Night . . . . . . . . . . . 46 First Man In Space . . . . . 48 Teach Briefs . . . . . . . . . . 50 Public Safety Spinoffs . . 52 Word Search . . . . . . . . . 54 Space Briefs . . . . . . . . . . 55
Space Toilets .. . . . . . . . . 55 Antares First Flight . . . . . . 55 Black Hole Spin . . . . . . . . 56 Europas Ocean . . . . . . . 58 Planck Mission .. . . . . . . . 59 Kepler Results . . . . . . . . . 60
ASTRONOMER
Theres a lot more to being an astronomer than simply staring through a telescope.
SPACEX
Once again, SpaceX has made a delivery to the ISS, and returned samples back.
ASTRONAUT
Ed Gibson reflects on his time as part of the last crew of Americas first space station.
SKYLAB
The successful repair of Skylab proved astronauts could work in space, which led to the ISS.
RESCUE WING
The 920th Rescue Wing clears the skies and seas before any rocket is launched in Florida.
Museum Spotlight . . . . . 62
This is the second issue of RocketSTEM magazine, which will be published monthly beginning in August. The third issue will be released in mid to late June of this year.
Editorial Staff Managing Editor: Chase Clark Photo Editor: J.L. Pickering Astronomy Editor: Mike Barrett Staff, Contributors & Advisors Tim Breitbach Brenden Clark Ben Evans Anthony Fitch Kaelan Jungmeyer Mike Killian Ken Kremer Kim Orr Robert Pearlman David Parmet Brice Russ Nicole Solomon Amy Shira Teitel Sherry Valare Kris Amundson Scott Ashkenaz Morten Arstad Scott Beale Ethan Hurdus Braden Kowitz Julian Leek Walter Scriptunas II Loretta Hidalgo Whitesides Michael Wright Rdio Zero Tony Achilles Catherine Baker Emily Carney Montserrat Cordero Sarah Cruddas Mike Deep Livia Ferreira Brandon Fibbs Kate Arkless Gray Andy Green Vicki Johnson Gene Mikulka Andrea Newson Julie Aderhold-Roach Janelle Harrier Wilson RocketSTEM Media Foundations Board of Directors Chase Clark Tim Brown Brenden Clark
This digital publication is available for free download as a PDF file. www.rocketstem.org RocketSTEM April 2013 Vol. 1 No. 2 (ISSN: 2326-0661) 2013 Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) RocketSTEM Media Foundation, Inc. P.O. Box 304409 Pensacola, Florida 32507 info@rocketstem.org
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This mosaic shows Curiosity rovers arm on Sol 149 (Jan. 5, 2013) at Yellowknife Bay basin where the rover has found widespread evidence for flowing water and discovered hydrated mineral veins and concretions around the rock ledge ahead and by the slithery chain Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo of narrow protruding rocks known as Snake River.
MISSION ACCOmPLISHED!
Curiosity discovers a habitable environment for life on Mars
By Ken Kremer
As NASAs Curiosity rover begins her eighth month exploring the Red Planet since the nail-biting touchdown inside Gale Crater on Aug. 5, 2012, she has made the most amazing finding thus far. After analyzing the first powder ever drilled from the interior of a Martian rock, Curiosity discovered key chemical ingredients necessary for life to have thrived on early Mars billions of years ago. Collecting those first particles bored from inside a rock on a planet beyond Earth marks a historic feat in humankinds exploration of the cosmos - and was crucial for achieving Curiositys goal to determine whether Mars ever could have supported microbial life, past or present. Curiosity has now achieved her goal of discovering a habitable environment on the Red Planet, mission scientists reported at a mid March briefing held at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C. Data collected by Curiositys two analytical chemistry labs (SAM and CheMin) confirm that the gray powder collected from inside the sedimentary rock of mudstone where the rover is now exploring near an ancient Martian stream bed - possesses a significant amount of phyllosilicate clay minerals; indicating an environment where Martian microbes could once have thrived in the distant past. Clay minerals form in neutral water which is much more conducive to supporting possible Martian life forms compared to the highly acidic watery environments found by NASAs Spirit and Opportunity Mars rovers over the past decade. We have found a habitable environment which is so benign and supportive of life that probably if this water was around, and you had been on the planet, you would have been able to drink it, said John Grotzinger, the chief scientist for the Curiosity Mars Science Laboratory mission at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif. Curiosity cored the rocky sample from a fine-grained, sedimentary outcrop, named John Klein, inside
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a shallow basin named Yellowknife Bay, and delivered pulverized powder to the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) and Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instruments inside the robot. On Feb. 8, 2013 (mission Sol 182), Curiosity used the rotary-percussion drill mounted on the tool turret at the end of the seven-foot (2.1 meter) long robotic arm to bore a circular hole about 0.63 inch (16 mm) wide and about 2.5 inches (64 mm) deep into John Klein that produced a slurry of gray tailings. For the first time we are examining ancient rocks that have not been exposed to the Martian surface environment, and weathering, and preserve the environment in which they formed, said Joel Hurowitz, Curiosity sampling system scientist at JPL. This is a key point because subsequent oxidation reactions can destroy organic molecules and thereby potential signs of habitability and life. The gray colored tailings give a completely fresh insight into Mars that offers a stark contrast to the prevailing views of reddish-orange rusty, oxidized dust. One theory is that it might be related to different oxidations states of iron that could potentially inform us about the habitability of Mars inside the rovers Gale Crater landing site. The presence of abundant phyllosilicate clay minerals in the John Klein drill powder indicates a fresh water environment. Further evidence derives from the veiny sedimentary bedrock shot through with calcium sulfate mineral veins that form in a neutral to mildly alkaline pH environment. Clay minerals make up at least 20 percent of the composition of this sample, said David Blake, principal investigator for the CheMin instrument at NASAs Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. The rovers long robotic arm fed aspirin-sized samples of the gray, pulverized powder into the miniaturized CheMin SAM analytical instruments on Feb. 22 and 23, or
Curiosity tool turret located at end of robotic arm is positioned with drill bit in contact with John Klein outcrop for first hammer drilling into Martian rock surface on Jan 31, 2013. Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo
At the center of this image is the hole in a rock where the Curiosity rover conducted its first sample drilling on Mars during its 182nd Martian day of operations. A test that produced the shallower hole two days earlier is shown to the right. The sample-collection hole is 0.63 inch (1.6 centimeters) in diameter and 2.5 inches (6.4 centimeters) deep. The mini drill Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS test hole has a depth of 0.8 inch (2 centimeters).
Sols 195 and 196. The samples were analyzed on Sol 200. Scientists were able to identify carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and phosphorus in the sample - all of which are essential elements for life as we know it based on organic molecules. But no significant levels of organics have been detected yet. The range of chemical ingredients we have identified in the sample is impressive, and it suggests pairings such as sulfates and sulfides that indicate a possible chemical energy source for micro-
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Curiosity is shown in this context mosaic view of the Yellowknife Bay basin taken on Jan. 26 (Sol 169) where the robot is currently working. The robotic arm is pressing down on the surface at John Klein outcrop of veined hydrated minerals - dramatically backdropped with her Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo ultimate destination; Mount Sharp.
organisms, said Paul Mahaffy, principal investigator of the SAM suite of instruments at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. The rock drilling capability is a significant advancement. It allows us to go beyond the surface layer of the rock, unlocking a time capsule of evidence about the state of Mars going back three or four billion years, said Louise Jandura of JPL and Curiositys chief engineer for the sampling system. Using our roving geologist, Curiosity, the scientists can choose the rock, get inside the rock and deliver the powdered sample to instruments on the rover for analysis. The high powered drill was the last of Curiositys 10 state-of-the-art instruments still to be checked out and put into full operation. The discovery of phyllosilicates on the floor of Gale crater was unexpected, and has delighted Today, Opportunity celebrates a truly unfathomable achievement, entering Year 10 on Mars since she rolled to a bumpy stop on January 24, 2004. Now shes at a super sweet spot for science loaded with clays and veined minerals and making the most remarkable findings yet about the planets watery past - building upon a long string of unthinkable discoveries due to her totally unforeseen longevity. Regarding achieving nine years, I never thought wed achieve nine the scientists. Based on spectral observations from Mars orbit. Grotzinger told me previously that phyllosilicates had only been detected in the lower reaches of Mount Sharp, the three mile (5 km) high mountain that is Curiositys ultimate destination. Finding the phyllosilicates so soon at Yellowknife Bay is a tribute to the team and validates the selection of Gale Crater as the landing site. Grotzinger said that Curiosity months! said Principal Investigator Prof. Steve Squyres of Cornell University. Every sol is a gift for our priceless assets on Mars. As of April 1, Opportunity has exceeded 3200 Sols, or Martian days. She is now 111 months into the three-month primary mission thats 37 times longer than the 90 day warranty. The rover remains healthy, has snapped over 178,000 images and driven over 22 miles marking the first overland expedition on another planet.
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Curiosity snapped this self portrait (right) on Feb. 8 with the MAHLI camera while sitting on flat sedimentary rocks of mudstone at the John Klein outcrop. Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo
will remain in the Yellowknife Bay area for several additional weeks or months to fully characterize the area. The rover will also conduct at least one more drilling campaign to try and replicate the results, check for organic molecules and search for new discoveries. The Curiosity science team believes that the current work area at Yellowknife Bay experienced repeated percolation of flowing liquid water billions of years ago The resilient, solar powered Opportunity robot is roving around Martian terrain where she proved that potentially life sustaining liquid water once flowed billions of years ago when the planet was warmer. She is investigating the inboard edge of Cape York - a hilly segment of the eroded rim of 14 mile (22 km) wide Endeavour Crater, featuring terrain with older rocks than previously inspected and unlike anything studied before. Its a place more than three billion years when Mars was warmer and wetter - and therefore was more hospitable to the possible evolution of life. So far Curiosity has snapped more than 48,000 images, traveled nearly 0.5 miles, conducted 25 analysis with the APXS spectrometer and fired over 12,000 laser shoots with the ChemCam instrument. Eventually, the six-wheeled mega rover will set off on the nearly year long trek to the base of Mount Sharp. old that no one ever dared dream of reaching prior to launch in the summer of 2003. Opportunity has accomplished breakthrough science by finding deposits of phyllosilicates - clay minerals stemming from an earlier epoch when liquid water flowed on Mars eons ago and perhaps may have been more favorable to sustaining microbial life because they form in more neutral pH water. They have never before been analyzed up close on the Martian surface; and have also just been discovered by NASAs new Curiosity rover at Gale Crater. We have found phyllosilicates at the Whitewater Lake area around Cape York, said Squyres. Its like a whole new mission since we arrived at Cape York. Opportunity also discovered additional hydrated mineral veins at Whitewater Lake, in addition to those found earlier at a spot named Homestake. Opportunity will continue to explore around the crater rim.
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Former astronaut Leland Melvin, NASAs associate administrator for education, speaks about the Exploration Design Challenge as Orion manager Mark Geyer, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden and Lockheed Martin CEO Marillyn Hewson look on.
Photo: Robert Pearlman/collectSPACE.com
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thought about, Bolden stated in an interview, referring to the outcome of the EDC. It may be totally different and it may even be affordable, which is most important. So, it is my expectation that we will find something that we didnt think about. The design challenge is divided into three levels. For the first two groups children in kindergarten through 4th grade, and 5th through 8th grades their teachers will lead them through studying the effects of radiation on human space travelers and analyzing materials that can simulate space radiation shielding for Orion. After participating in these activities, the students will recommend materials that best block harmful radiation. At the high school level, grades 9 through 12, students will design the shielding to protect a sensor inside Orion from space radiation. There will be five teams chosen to test their designs in a virtual radiation simulator, said Leland Melvin, a Space Shuttle astronaut and NASAs associate administrator for education. All five teams that are chosen will go down to Kennedy Space Center for the launch of EFT-1 and there will be a final down-select of the winning design that will possibly be flown on EFT-1. Were banking on this design because one of you, or one of our astronauts, will be flying to Mars, he said. We will be using space-certified radiation sensors sitting behind your radiation shield to see how effective it is working at blocking radiation.
An artist concept (above) shows Orion as it will appear in space for the Exploration Flight Test-1 attached to a Delta IV stage, (Left) NASAs Orion Exploration Flight Test-1 (EFT-1) insignia. Images: NASA
All of you who participate will be part of something that has never been done before, the first test flight of Orion, Marilyn Hewson, president and CEO of Lockheed Martin, said, addressing the students who attended the event and who were watching live on NASAs television channel. Lockheed Martin is NASAs prime contractor for the Orion MPCV and is building the capsule that will fly on EFT-1. Every journey starts with a single step and the Orions Exploration Flight Test-1 is a significant first step toward deep space human exploration, she said. This mission will lay the foundation for future Orion flights and will take astronauts past the moon and on to asteroids and Mars. All the students who take part in the design challenge will join the mission as honorary crew members by having their names flown aboard the Orion. The winning teams status will be more than honorary their radiation shield design may someday protect Orions real crew members. Youre about to embark on an amazing journey, Hewson said. The skills youll learn from this challenge problem solving, critical thinking and systems engineering are the very same skills that our engineers apply to our most challenging problems every day. You are taking on a mission that is hugely important keeping our astronauts safe during a journey through deep space. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden and Lockheed Martin CEO Marillyn Hewson sign an For details on how students can enter agreement enabling NASAs Exploration Design Challenge for students. NASAs Exploration Design Challenge, Photo: Robert Pearlman/collectSPACE.com see NASAs Education website.
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unique. It is a radio astronomy observatory, so instead of being on a mountain peak, its in a valley thats surounded by the Appalachian Mountains and national forests. The mountains protect us from manmade radio waves that would interfere with the very faint radio signals coming from the universe. Just as optical observatories have to be concerned with light polution, we need to be in a fairly isolated place with good shielding from radio wave interference. We have not only our mountains for shielding, but also the National Radio Quiet Zone. When the Observatory was established more than 50 years ago, the National Radio Quiet Zone was created around it, within which new transmitters are controlled so that they dont interfere with the radio telescopes. This is a unique region in the United States. We dont have cell phone reception in the valley and we dont have wireless at the Observatory. People one valley over can have it, but as
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The stereotypical view of an astronomer is a person who spends all night staring through a giant telescope at the stars. Is that a fair assessment? cause I study the radio waves that come in from space, I can use the radio telescope any time of the day or night. The daytime radio sky is dark, not bright blue like the daytime sky at visible wavelengths. When Im on a project I might be scheduled from midnight to 2 a.m. or from 8 a.m. to midnight. You really cant tell. It makes for a very different kind of cycle to your day. Most of the time, I am not using the telescope. The typical research
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Is it true that common household items can interfere with the telescope?
thing. There are the intentional transmitters such as cell phone towers, TV stations and so on. But then
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projects I do use a telescope for just a few tens of hours, but then theres many months of trying to understand what it is exactly that we found.
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Does working on a radio telescope require a different skillset than an optical telescope? background in the physical sciences and mathematics, and above all an interest in doing astronomical research. Anyone who is smart
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With such a vast universe, do astronomers simply focus on a single question, or are they multitaskers, seeking the answers to multiple questions at once? mers tend to do research in just one or two areas. I typically have several projects going at once, sometimes lasting several years. Between the time that you devise an experiment, and the time that you actualy get to use a telescope may be a year or more. So Im really doing multiple projects and I have collaborators scattered around the world that are in complementary fields to radio astronomy. One thing Im very interested in is the extent of the Milky Way. How far out does it really go? And what is happening at the transition between galactic and intergalactic space? We can study that using radio waves. We can study that in the ultraviolet using data from the Hubble Space Telescope. We can study that in the infrared using data from other telescopes. If you go out on a clear night what you will see is stars in the Milky Way, our home galaxy. Stars like the Sun put out most of their energy at optical, visible, wavelengths. They shine in the visible and we can see that. In-between the stars, though, there are clouds of dust and gas that do not give off visible light, but shine very brightly in radio waves. And they can shine very brightly at infrared wavelengths as well. So the universe that we study with radio waves, is very complementary to the universe that we can study with visible light. You need all of this to put together a coherent picture of whats going on. There are many things out there that dont give off any visible light at all.
astrophysicist is about the same regardless of what instruments you end up using. You do need to learn a number of very specific instrumental techniques, or if you are making theoretical calculations on a computer, you would need to learn some specialized numerical techniques.
The Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope, located in West Virginia, is the one of the worlds premier single-dish radio telescopes. With access to 85 percent of the celestial sphere, the Photo: Walter Scriptunas II telescope is in operation an average of nearly 18 hours per day.
enough and has the diligence to become a sucessful research scientist could certainly succeed in many other fields. But there is something very special about being at the edge of discovery, and about being the first person to learn something new about our Universe. That ability to discover something new appeals to me. The educational background needed to be an astronomer or
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tion. As we sit here on the surface of the Earth, were protected by the atmosphere from a lot of really nasty radiation that the sun gives off. Were protected from most of the ultraviolet radiation and the Xrays and the high-energy particles. But conversely, if we want to study
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X-rays from the Sun, for example, weve got to get up above the atmosphere and go into space. There are two wavelength bands where the atmosphere is transparent and lets in radiation from outside. One is at visible wavelengths. After all you can see the stars at night and that means that the sky is transparent to visible light. The other is in the radio. The long wavelengths of radio waves, the low energy photons, come pretty much unimpeded through the atmosphere. Only at visible and radio wavelengths can astronomy be done from the ground. If you want to study ultraviolet, or most infrared emission, or X-rays, youve got to go into space. So again, its complementary.
The Green Bank Telescope is the worlds largest fully steerable radio telescope. Sitting within the heart of the National Radio Quiet Zone, The telescope focuses 2.3 acres of radio light on sensitive receivers at the top of the telescope. It is 485 feet tall which is nearly as tall as Photo: Walter Scriptunas II the nearby mountains.
sider careers in science, technology, engineering or mathematics. A lot of kids these days dont have good local role models that would allow them to think that maybe they could become a scientist. Or maybe they could become a mechanical engineer or a mechanic on a large structure like a radio telescope. Its important to get out and get the message out. telescope. In the last six years more than 1,000 individual scientists and their students have used the GBT for projects ranging from comets to cosmology. In recent years federal funding for most scientific research has fallen short of what is needed and the pressure on the GBT is symptomatic of a larger problem.
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How did you become an astronomer and end up working with the NRAO?
ested in science. Luckily, I got to attend Drexel University in Philadelphia. It has a cooperative education program that puts students to work in industries related to their major field of study for six months out of each year. You actually work in your profession and get paid! In that program it took five years instead of four to get a degree, but it was worth it. I was lucky enough to get a position as an undergraduate research assistant at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory Headquarters in Charlottesville, Virginia. So as a teenager I was thrown into a research environment and just loved it. I really thrived on being around scientists who were active in research, and I loved the whole scientific endeavor. I would come to work on a Monday morning and there would be someone who had found something interesting that they wanted to talk about. It was a very exciting experience. Ive also always enjoyed talking about research, and Im more than happy to speak to people or make presentations and try to inspire the next generation -- not necessarily to become astronomers, but to con-
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There have been news reports that consideration is being given to closing the Green Bank Telescope facility for budgetary reasons. Is that true? choice. This is something that the National Science Foundation is considering, and it would mean a massive reduction in the radio astronomy capability of the United States. Theres no other telescope that can do the majority of the research that is done here in Green Bank. It would be a major loss of scientific facilities for American astronomers. We operate the Geen Bank Telescope (GBT) for the National Science Foundation at no charge to the scientists who use it. Any scientist, whether at a small college or a large university, who has a good idea can write a proposal to use the GBT. These are evaluated by independent scientists, and the best proposals get time on the
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Looking through a telescope seems to be only a small part of astronomy research. What else is involved? ting here at my desk in front of several computers. The amounts of data that were getting now can be so large that you need fairly hefty computational facilities to make any progress in analyzing them. One of the things that we do with astronomical radio signals is to try to turn them into images of the radio sky. If your eyes could see radio waves, how would the sky appear? Our eyes are very good at picking up patterns, and understanding relationships. We understand much more from points on a graph than from the same numbers in a table. The Observatory employs computer specialists who work in data visualization. Its an increasingly important field in astronomy. We have electronics engineers here who build the one-of-a-kind receivers needed to pick up and amplify the very faint
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radio waves from space. We have software engineers that specialize in telescope control or in analyzing and processing the data that come in. There are mechanical engineers that design and repair the large dishes. Its a diverse bunch that we have here and it takes a lot of different kinds of talent to run an observatory.
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With the sheer amount of data being accumulated, is it possible that things are missed only to be discovered in future analysis of the data?
omers of the world have taken a quick look at the entire into an archive so that peosky. But what weve realized ple interested in looking at it is that there are things out again, or reprocessing it, can there that could be flickerdo so. But this brings up an ing on and off, and that were interesting point related to off when we were looking at your previous question. There them. are objects in space that we Thats the whole new call pulsars: the collapsed area of time domain asremnant of a star that has extronomy, just getting started, ploded. A pulsar has about monitoring the sky over and the same amount of matover again, and looking for ter as our Sun, which is a lot, these odd bursts of light, rabut its size is just a few miles dio waves or X-rays that may be coming from objects we across. Its very dense. Pulsars havent discovered yet. emit beams of radio waves. They rotate like a lighthouse Theres a huge amount of and the radio beams sweep research to do as well in simacross the Earth. We can see ply accounting for the basic constituents of the universe pulsars to great distances as they evolve over time. We and they are like little clocks out there in the Milky Way. know that there is this stuff The receiver room at the top of the Green Bank Telescope. Were always interested called dark matter. Dark matPhoto: Walter Scriptunas II in finding new pulsars, in ter is what holds galaxies tonew locations, and with new gether. It supplies the gravity properties. But searching for pulsars One of the items youve that keeps the Sun from flying out of is a very data intensive process. been studying recently is the Milky Way, yet we really do not Once you scan an area of the sky a giant cloud of gas. What have a clue as to what this stuff is. with a radio telescope, looking for have we learned about it? Its amazing to me how much the faint pulses that might only be we have learned during the course a milli-second long, you have this Lockman: Thats a very inter- of my career. And yet knowledge huge amount of data. Turns out that esting gas cloud. Its existence has in one area doesnt always conit is very efficient to use the human been known for about 50 years. But nect up with knowledge in another. eye to look at this pattern to distin- until recently no one quite under- I have this image of islands of understood where it was or what it was. guish a signal from the noise. standing sitting apart in an ocean of Using the Green Bank Telescope, ignorance. We can see the islands, Scientists and educators at Green Bank and West Virginia Uni- we were able to map its hydrogen but we dont necessarily have the versity are collaborating with teams with the highest precision that has bridges between one island and of high school students to examine been possible. And what looked another island. And new islands appulsar search data and try to dis- like a blob in earlier studies was re- pear all the time. Theres still a lot of cover new pulsars. Theyve had re- vealed to be this huge structure that discovery to be made and a lot of ally good success so far. Its genuine resembles a comet. these connections to be made.
discovery, and once a team from a high school thinks theyve found something, theres a protocol they go through to confirm it. Eventually they get to use the Green Bank Telescope for re-observation and ultimate confirmation. A paper is just now being published in the Astrophysical Journal about the first half dozen or so new pulsars found by these teams of students. That is an example of high school students who are interested in science and doing real research. Its not that different from how I started and its great.
Were begining to get an understanding of this very massive gas cloud -- a million times the mass of the Sun -- that is on a trajectory to intersect the Milky Way in maybe 30 million years. Its liable to cause bursts of star formation on the other side of our galaxy. Its a fascinating object and there is so much we dont understand about it yet.
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Whats left out there to discover for the next generation of astronomers?
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Starting in astronomy
beginner guide to stargazing for students
By Mike Barrett
differentiated by the path of light through the instrument. The two most common types are Newtonian and Cassegrain. The Newtonians focus and direct the light to the side of the optical tube, whereas the Cassegrains reflect it back to the bottom of the tube allowing for a more compact design.
than other stellar subjects. If the primary purpose of the telescope is planetary observation then a Cassegrain or refractor style of telescope is ideal. These offer longer focal lengths allowing for greater magnification. When looking at star clusters, distant galaxies and nebulas you need to get as much light as possible. This is where size matters, and the larger the primary optic, the better. Reflectors offer very good light gathering/price performance, but at the expense of physical size.
Solid Foundations
It does not matter how good your telescope is, if it is not anchored on a solid foundation then it will not be working at its best. Indeed many advanced astronomers pay far more for the telescope mount than they do for the optical tube. There are two types of telescope mounts available: an altazimuth mount, and a German equatorial mount. The altazimuth or Alt-Az mount is similar to a tripod used for photography. Indeed I use a photographers tripod myself when travelling. This is a little crude in that the control of the position of the telescope although more expensive tripod heads can give some fine degree of movement. More expensive mounts have slow motion cables allowing fine tuning of the telescope. The Alt-Az mount has two controls and works on
Telescope Technologies
The next thing to decide is what you want to use the telescope for. There are two basic technologies used to make telescopes: refraction and reflection. A refractor telescope uses two lenses to collect and focus light at a certain point. This design is the classic telescope invented in Holland and made famous by Galileo in 1609, and also used by Admiral Nelson. This is a handy instrument capable of being used for terrestrial observation as well as celestial. A reflector telescope uses mirrors to gather and reflect light. Typically there will be two mirrors, a large primary mirror and a smaller secondary mirror. The primary mirror determines how much light is received, and the secondary mirror directs the image to the eyepiece. There are a number of different types of reflector telescopes mainly
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the principle of compass direction (azimuth) and elevation (altitude), effectively moving the tripod up and down, or left and right. To keep an object in view over a period of time both controls need to be adjusted. The German equatorial mount, also known as an equatorial mount or GEM, is a much more complex mounting system that takes into consideration the movement of stars around the celestial pole. Setting up the equatorial mount can be complicated as one axis of the mount needs to point to the polar star. Once properly aligned the stars can be tracked just by using a single control. This control can be driven with a motor enabling the precise tracking of stars throughout the night. This type of mount is ideal for astro photographers as it keeps the aspect and relationship of the stellar objects aligned over time. Another type of mount available is a Dobsonian. This is actually a variant of the AltAz mount, but with the base actually on the ground with a swivel plate. The telescope drops onto this and there are
in as much as it is pure physics and engineering. To use the telescope you need to understand the movement of the stars and be able to find and hone in on the objects that you want to view. Wouldnt it be nice if you could press a few buttons and the telescope would move to your area of interest and keep it in view as the earth rotates? The advent of the GOTO mount has achieved this. To the purists this is sacrilege, but for observers with limited time and experience it is a boon. The technology does make us lazy and prevents us learning the full majesty of the night skies, but on the other hand it opens up a new frontier to those who do not have the time or the inclination to learn the constellations. The GOTO mount needs to be calibrated each time it is used. This lets the electronic wizardry know exactly where it is and what the time is. From that it knows where all the stars are and which ones can be seen. Once set up all you need to do is press a few buttons and the mount will orientate the telescope to your target object and then start tracking it through the night skies.
more light to reach the retinas letting you see the finer details. It doesnt end there though. Your eyes are adaptive and in low light will switch to monochrome, letting you see more but at the expense of color. This is the reason that size matters in the telescope primary lens or mirror. More light getting to the eye means more detail. This does not mean that you will not be able to see some great objects. Of course the Moon is always stunning. Its brightness means that even the cheapest and smallest telescope will render detail. The brightest deep space objects can be seen with the naked eye, in particular Orion and the Pleiades. Training the telescope on these will reveal a lot of detail. The clouds of nebulosity in Orion and the stellar dust around the stars in the Pleiades can be spectacular.
Summary
A telescope is a light bucket. The bigger the bucket the more you can see. If you are looking for portability then a Cassegrain style of telescope is good; for performance then a reflector would be my choice. Getting bang for bucks, the Dobsonian is hard to beat. For an all round performer, a refractor is one to look at. To make things easy then a GOTO mount helps enormously. The telescope is the first part of the astronomical experience. Most telescopes will come bundled with one or more eyepieces, but it is the eyepieces that can make all the difference to your observing experience. I will be covering eyepieces in a separate article. When I started in astronomy my personal kit was a 90mm (3.5) Spotting Scope with a MaksutovCassegrain design. It mounts on my photography tripod and is light and portable. This was very quickly joined by a 5 Newtonian reflector on a GOTO mount, it is less portable but better for deep sky observing. Both of these were obtained for just over $500, though I have spent somewhat more on accessories since.
friction plates to control the elevation. This type of telescope looks like a canon. One advantage of a Dob is that it can be very large, but still controllable by hand.
Going HighTech
So far everything has been low tech
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Dragon attached to the International Space Station during the CRS-2 mission. Photo: NASA
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Engines roar to life (above) as a Falcon 9 rocket begins a journey to space that will send the Dragon capsule on a cargo run to the International Space Station. The rocket clears the pad (below) as it rises above the horizon of the Atlantic Ocean. Photos: Anthony Fitch
and liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon, SpaceX continues Americas mission to re-supply the International Space Station from U.S. soil.
In 2006, SpaceX, a private rocket and spacecraft development company led by Elon Musk, began plowing the path for a new generation of spaceflight, with the launch of the Falcon 1 rocket. In June 2010, with the conclusion of the Shuttle era around the corner, its successor, Falcon 9, stood upon the launchpad poised to make its grand entrance into the aerospace world. The Falcon family was introducing itself, one test flight at a time. I was a witness to the Falcon 9 taking its maiden flight that day, and I was immediately enchanted with this little company that could. The sound of the launch being broadcast on the radio filled the air. As the countdown came to an end, I watched the Falcon 9 come to life as it lifted up and away from my view. It was a monumental event for SpaceX and several successful landmark missions would soon follow this historic moment. In December 2010, the Dragon, a reusable spacecraft designed to eventually carry crew and cargo, was launched aboard the Falcon 9. It was then
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safely returned back to the ground, making SpaceX the first commercial company to effectively carry out the launch and recovery of a spacecraft. On another demonstration flight in May 2012, Dragon was delivered to orbit again by the Falcon 9 to berth with the International Space Station, be opened by the ISS crew and emptied of the supplies inside, then detach and return safely to Earth. The completed mission was a flawless display of Dragons capability. In October 2012, Dragon would be delivered again to the ISS, this time on its first official cargo re-supply mission (CRS-1). This was the first of 12 re-supply missions SpaceX was awarded by NASA. Though a problem occurred when one of the first stage engines shut down on the Falcon 9, its primary job of delivering Dragon safely into orbit after adjusting its flight path was still accomplished. It again successfully berthed to the ISS, and remained attached until it returned to Earth, landing in the Pacific Ocean. On March 1, 2013, I had the privilege of witnessing the second commercial re-supply mission (CRS-2) from 525 feet above the ground. From the top of the roof of the Vehicle Assembly Building, with the wind whipping the chilly air around, Launch Complex 40 was bathed in the late morning sunlight when intermittent cloud cover was forgiving. Falcon 9 stood proud with Dragon, ready to fly. Though the rocket is on the smaller side, it has a powerful presence. As Shakespeare wrote, Though she be but little, she is fierce!
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I had an eagle-eye view as the Falcon 9 rose up from its launchpad, with Dragon leading the way through the cloud covered sky. Its sound punched through the wind, letting out a low intense rumble as it headed for orbit, getting louder and louder with each second that passed. As the rocket rose higher, its sound started to fade, until it completely disappeared. The Falcon 9 had performed its job and it was time for Dragon to commence its part of the mission. Soon it would meet up with the ISS for the delivery of supplies and experiments to the crew.
Fast Facts
The name game:
The Falcon 9 got its name from the Millennium Falcon the spacecraft commanded by Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy. The 9 comes from the nine first-stage Merlin engines that propel the rocket. Dragon was named after the fictional character Puff the Magic Dragon because in 2002, critics thought that the original goals SpaceX had in mind seemed to exist more in the realm of makebelieve.
Photo: NASA
The arrival of Dragon to the ISS was delayed due to a minor setback with its oxidizer tanks, but the ground crews worked quickly to identify the problem, and get it back on track. On March 3 it was successfully captured and berthed to the ISS. It delivered 2,300 pounds of cargo to the residents on board, stayed attached for 22 days, and was then filled with over 3,000 pounds of cargo to carry home. On March 26, Dragon completed its mission and returned to Earth. It splashed down in the Pacific Ocean a few hundred miles off the coast of Baja California (which is a neat coincidence since baja means come down in Spanish). SpaceX has ambitious plans for the future. Missions are already scheduled on its manifest through 2017 for several customers including the Canadian Space Agency, Orbcomm, Iridium Communications, Asia Satellite Telecommunications and Thaicom. These resupply, satellite placement and launch services will also continue to serve NASA along with the other companies that have placed their trust in SpaceX. Manned flights may begin to Low Earth Orbit (LEO) in 2015. Opinions about the ending of the Shuttle program vary. Some feel that we were not prepared to end it without having something else in the works. Some feel that it motivated us to look towards the future. With determined companies like SpaceX pushing forward with success after success, they demonstrate their competency and capability and create a standard for other commercial companies entering the race to live up to. SpaceX provides us with an exciting snapshot of the future, as they continually prove to the world, that determination can decide destiny.
Capture a Dragon:
When the Dragon spacecraft successfully berthed to the International Space Station in May 2012, it was the first commercial spacecraft to ever accomplish this feat.
Withstanding reentry:
It was built with a heat shield made of PICA-X, which can withstand the extreme heat generated upon reentry from a lunar return mission. The design of the heat shield was completed by NASA and brought to life by SpaceX. The spacecrafts shape creates lift during reentry, while roll control is provided by 18 Draco thrusters, ensuring it stays on course for a smooth landing.
A manned future:
For now, it only carries cargo, but it is being refined to carry a flight crew as early as 2015.
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Backdropped by Earths horizon, the International Space Station is photographed by an STS-130 crew member on Space Shuttle Endeavour in 2010. Photo: NASA
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NASA astronaut Kevin Ford (top left) watches a water bubble float freely between him and the camera, showing his image refracted, within the Unity node of the International Space Station. Marshall Porterfield, Life and Physical Sciences Division Director at NASA Headquarters (right), spoke about the human body in microgravity and other life sciences.
Photo: NASA/Carla Cioffi
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NASA Socials:
The view of Earth from space really gives the sense that the planet is a living, breathing organism.
- Ron
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Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield was in orbit commanding the ISS during the NASA Social, but one of the attendees made certain a small cardboard likeness of him was present on the ground for the event.
Photo: Nicole Solomon
to talk with three of the six current crew members NASA astronauts Kevin Ford and Tom Marshburn, and Chris Hadfield of the Canadian Space Agency and, in-person, astronaut Don Petit; NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations, Bill Gerstenmaier; Director of NASAs Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Application Division, Marshall Porterfield; and NASA Associate Space Station Program Scientist, Tara Ruttley. All were a huge hit with those in attendance. Blogger Jamie Rich commented, NASA Socials are a blast! You get access to the coolest stuff astronauts, scientists, and engineers. Even if youre a not a space geek like me, its super fun. Rich (@jamerz3294) also asked the first question for his nephew, Thomas: How much time does the International Space Station take to perform a collision avoidance maneuver? The answer: the ISS can now do a reboost to avoid space debris in just six to seven hours. Other questions ran the gamut from how much oxygen is used daily, to unintended scientific discoveries, how weightlessness affects the body, how the
astronauts utilize math in their work, and the condition of the 32 fish flown to the ISS last year. When one young woman asked, When do you think fat people will be able to go to space? the astronauts diplomatically stated that hopefully soon everyone will be able to get this incredible experience we are lucky enough to be part of. As eager as the attendees were to devour the information being presented, the NASA employees were just as eager to share their experiences, and do their best to answer the myriad of questions thrown their way.
Generally, what we do is kind of out there and out of reach for most people, said Don Petit. But to interact with them first hand, to have them communicating with the ISS, to see the looks on their faces as they were doing soits invigorating for the people on the ground and in space alike. When asked about the communication challenges NASA faces with the public, Bob Jacobs said candidly, I think we need to do a much better job talking about the relevance of the work going on in space. The crew is working on vital research that impacts us here on Earth and will help inform our future beyond low-Earth orbit. People who claim to be green should closely study the space station. We recycle everything. But we have to talk about why were up there and what the research were doing means. The International Space Station is a model for international cooperation. When you think about all the agreements, the nations involved, and the technology innovation needed to bring it all
During a NASA Social event in the nations capital, 150 social media followers went on a tour of the Smithsonian Institutions Air and Space Museum. Photo: Nicole Solomon
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What we are learning in space is going to help us explore the solar system. The research we are doing on the station is making life better on Earth. We are studying our planet 24 hours a day.
- @Astro_Ron
together, its an amazing feat of engineering and science. The ISS Science Social was just the first such NASA event during D.C.s Social Media Week. The other was a Google+ Hangout, which allowed attendees to log in to a panel discussion and hang out with astronauts Ron Garan and Nicole Stott. According to NASA, the three primary goals of the ISS are educating the children of today to be the leaders and space explorers of tomorrow; returning the knowledge gained in space research for the benefit of society; and enabling future space exploration missions. What is so special about these social media events is that they mirror the very mission of the space station itself. Ron Garan, who has more than three million followers on Google+ and 95,000 followers on Twitter, is using social media to change the face of NASA. The founder of Fragile Oasis said, The research we are doing on the station is making life better on Earth. We are studying our planet 24 hours a day. The view of Earth from space really gives the sense that the planet is a living, breathing organism. And I have a responsibility and an obligation to share my experience of living in space with as many people as I can. Being an astronaut, we are basically ambassadors of humanity. What we are learning in space now is going to help us explore the solar system tomorrow.
It may be a while before NASA puts out a call for farmers to produce space crops (top right), but thats not to say that astronauts may not one day be growing a few of their own food stuffs aboard the International Space Station. Photo: NASA Astronaut Ron Garan (top left) poses while taking photos of Earth from within the ESAbuilt Cupola aboard the ISS.
Photo: NASA
NASA Social attendees (bottom) pose for a group photograph following a NASA Social exploring science on the ISS on Feb. 20.
Photo: NASA/Carla Cioffi
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Skylabs Ed Gibson
Americas first space station, Skylab was launched into orbit on a Saturn V rocket in May of 1973. Three manned missions to the outpost were immensely successful. Repairs made to the orbital station during several spacewalks ultimately proved that it was possible for astronauts to conduct work in outer space, which gave NASA the confidence to eventually follow Skylab with on-orbit assembly of the International Space Station. Astronaut-scientist Edward G. Gibson, who earned a doctorate in engineering with a minor in physics, was the Science Pilot for the third and final mission to Skylab in late 1973, returning to Earth in February of 1974. Being the last humans to board Skylab, the crew was kept busy from day one, but still found time to enjoy the view. on that. Bill [William Pogue], the Pilot, did get sick and he was sick for a number of weeks, which slowed him down. Thats just the nature of the animal unfortunately and hard to predict. We got up there and immediately had a lot of work to do because the previous crew had done a great job. They started slow and finished fast. Even though Ground Control tried to make several allowances, they really started us a little faster than we were ready for. We ended up being behind the scheduled activities as opposed to ahead of it, which is where you always like to be. We sorted through that and by the time the smoke cleared at the end of the mission we had accomplished the same average work per day that the previous crew had done. You never get tired of looking out the window. Thats something I wish everyone could do. If people could experience zero gravity while looking out the window, they would have a different perception of our home planet. Pictures are great, but they dont really give you the same physical and intellectual perspective. For all astronauts, reentering the Earths atmosphere and adapting to gravity once again is always a tough task, both mentally and physically. Gibson: After you burn the engine and you slow up just slightly, you gradually start dropping down toward the atmosphere. The first thing you notice is a violet glow, a very soft glow. Once we got down low and slow enough that we could pop our drogue chutes and then the main chutes, I thought, Well, were back to one gravity. But I still felt like we were pulling three Gs. Without any gravity for three months, it was tough for the body to get used to it again. It was a rude awakening and disappointment actually. When we finally hit the water, it was a good firm slap. We flipped upside-down so we had to inflate airbags that popped us upright. That was probably the most uncomfortable part of the whole flight: bobbing up and down on the ocean in a closed, damp cabin, hanging in the straps with the heat of reentry soaking back in. There was no imminent danger to it. It was just uncomfortable. After you flip upright you are pulled up onto the carrier deck. Immediately, as you are laying there and then when you try to get out, you feel more disappointment, at least I did, because I realized that for the rest of my life, no matter how hard I push off, I can no longer float. And no matter where I go, once again, I have to haul along tremendous amounts of meat and bone. Rolling over at night turns into a real engineering challenge. You take your movements for granted now because your body and your mind have adapted to it. But after not having to do that for a while, it is like being down here and having lead weights tied all over your body. It takes around two hours before you can walk stably, but you still have to walk with your feet wide apart. After two days, you could move around pretty well. And then you got close to preflight levels of stability after around two weeks, so from that standpoint we were pretty good.
A conversation with
Astronaut Edward Gibson spoke with RocketSTEM about the final Skylab mission and other topics. Here is the condensed interview.
Gibson: Well, lets see. What was it like? How do I ever give you a concise answer to that one? The beginning, of course, is always exciting, the liftoff on through rendezvous and docking. Once you get inside the station, you encounter two challenges. First, there is a lot of work to get started. Second, you also have to be careful that you dont move too fast or youll get space sickness. Jerry [Gerald Carr], who was the commander, and myself, did alright
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Luckily for the Skylab residents, NASA had begun to understand the importance of exercise while in orbit and provided the crew with crude, but functional, workout devices. Gibson: We had a bicycle Ergometer, which was used primarily to keep the cardiovascular system in shape. That worked pretty well. We had Exergenies, essentially resistance devices, that were like lifting weights back down here on the ground. We also had what I call a poormans treadmill. Right now they have folks living up there in luxury with a first-class treadmill. We didnt have that available so Bill Thornton, who was an ingenious doctor that later flew on some Shuttle flights, came up with a way to hold us down to the deck with about our own weight by putting elastic straps over our shoulders and then a thin Teflon sheet about two feet wide and four
ercise, so we came back in slightly better condition. Despite advances in exercise equipment for use in zero gravity, Gibson believes that bone loss during a manned mission to Mars might still be an issue. Gibson: One of the real worries, of course, is going to Mars or on some other long duration mission where you are in zero gravity continuously. First of all, just landing on Mars and being able to stand up and maneuver around could be an issue. Second, calcium loss from the bones could also be a problem. NASA felt that, on the average, we would have been OK up to about a year and a half. A bone is just like a muscle in that, if you exercise it, it retains its strength; for a bone, its its calcium. And, of course, the parts you dont exercise in zero gravity like
outside Skylab during three spacewalks, on top of setting a world record with his crewmates for the longest time spent in space, which was a record that was not topped until 1978 by the Soviet Union. Gibson: I also really enjoyed the EVAs, the spacewalks. You really get to see the Earth as you dont see it from inside, and the feeling of height is a little bit different. I dont know to give you that feeling of height other than through an analogy. Lets come back to Earth and go up to the top of a tall building where you look out. The Empire State Building or Sears Tower will do. Its pleasant and relaxing. But then lets open the window and walk out to the end of a long springboard where a steel fisted Hulk Hogan grabs you by your ankles and holds your head down. Now, intellectually, you know youll never fall, and even though youre at the same height as you were inside, youve got to admit it feels a bit different. You get that same feeling on the spacewalk just more of it. You just glide over Earth at a very serene five miles per second. And the laws of Sir Isaac Newton give you full intellectual confidence that youre up there to stay. But when you move away from the station, look down hundreds of miles at Earth and dont feel or see anything else around you, you wonder if that Newton guy was maybe. just a little bit wrong. Then you take the smile off your face and get back to work. The Apollo Telescope Mount (ATM), a solar observatory attached to Skylab, was the principle responsibility of Gibson during his mission. The ATM was able to make observations at wavelengths from extreme ultraviolet to infrared. Gibson: The ATM started out back in the early days as we were pulling together the components of what was to become Skylab, previously called the Apollo Extension System. The solar experiments of ATM were to be done automatically and mounted on the Apollo capsule. But then, when space station came along, they recognized that here was a way to get in-place humans involved in the acquisition of
Ed Gibson operates Skylabs solar telescope array from the control console in the multiple docking adapter. One hand grips the table to keep him from floating away. Photo: NASA via Retro Space Images
feet long under our feet. In that arrangement we could walk or run by letting our feet slide over the Teflon. That helped keep some of the muscles in shape in our hips and legs that we wouldnt have been able to do otherwise. It worked out pretty well. We exercised about an hour and a half every day, which was longer than the previous crews had to exyou do down here are the legs and the hips. We came back [from Skylab] in reasonable condition. I also think theyve developed some effective ways to circumvent most of these problems. Id hate to see us have to go to a rotating space station, because I enjoyed zero gravity! Gibson spent more than 15 hours
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Gibson
solar data using ATMs seven different instruments. ATM became a whole separate module that looked at the Sun in X-rays, ultraviolet and white light. We were also able to look at the Suns corona at any time by creating our own artificial solar eclipse. We really were able see the Sun as never before. The most enjoyable part of it was that we had television displays onboard in which we could see what some of the instruments were seeing, which helped improve the quality of data we acquired. One observation we really wanted to make was of the very early phase of a solar flare so that the investigators could get a better understanding of what happens in its initiation phase, what sets it off, and how we can better predict it. We finally came up with precursors that we could see in the ultraviolet displays that would tell us that the active region that we were looking at was becoming more unstable and about to pop. Towards the end of the mission we got reasonably good at that. We did get the early phases of a flare and we also saw the Sun as few people have ever seen it before. We were able to get a lot of information about bright points, coronal mass ejections, early phases of a flare, better definition of an active region and the progression in time of all of these phenomena. The ATM kept me sane, because when you are up there for that length of time, you want some mental challenges. Just pushing buttons by rote gets old after a little while. I enjoyed having that kind of mental challenge that the ATM presented. I think anyone that is going to be in space for any length of time ought to have something thats going to be mentally challenging and enjoyable for them rather than just keeping up with a checklist.
the reentry of the Skylab was earlier than we anticipated so we couldnt reach it in to prevent its re-entry. Every astronaut believes that STEM education is important to not just the future development of space exploration, but also to having a thriving national economy. Gibson: Im glad we still have great enthusiasm for space in our youth. In general, the road is pretty straightforward for kids today. First, figure out what you like. Is it medicine? Is it physics, geology, oceanography, material physics, astrophysics or piloting aircraft? Whatever it is, be as good as you possibly can at it. Most important, enjoy it thoroughly! If you really want to get into the astronaut program, use your high level of technical skills to enter. But remember, because the competition is stiff, youve got to really be good at it. For every person who applies to the astronaut program, theres probably another 20 to 80 who dont make it. Its not because theyre not competent; theyre just not quite as good as the people who did make it. Youve really got to be at the top of your game. Take what you enjoy, and go do it with enthusiasm and excellence, If you dont make it, you still have a good profession you enjoy. Now the question is whether there is going to be a space program for them to get into? This is the first time in 50 years that we have not had a major operational program driving the development of technology. That is highly unfortunate. Weve got some technology development, but it lacks focus, firm requirements and well defined programmatics that all relate to a clear inspirational vision. The development of human spaceflight, putting a space station into orbit, going to the moon and using reusable spacecraft were each driven by inspiring vision. That vision, drive and persistence is lacking today. When you look back at Apollo, you see that it required the development of many new technologies in order to get the job done. Sometimes we had systems developments going in parallel until the most reliable could be delineated. The development of these new technologies had a lot of technological spinoff,
Gibson and his crewmates, Gerald Carr and William Pogue, were the last humans to visit Skylab, but at the time they werent certain if that would truly be the case. Gibson: We were the last American crew that we knew of that would get up to Skylab for several years to come. We also didnt know if the
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which created a financial multiplication factor that increased the gross national product several times than what was invested by introducing these new technologies nationally and making us more competitive in the world marketplace. The early days of Apollo were rather heady. They returned many new technologies to our nation, commercially, as well as in terms of pride, spirit, and focus on education for the youth coming up. You just dont see real, concrete challenges for them anymore. It just isnt there. We need national and administration leadership that takes its eyes off its shoes and looks to the horizon and beyond for human exploration. Our Moon, Mars, and other bodies in our solar system should be specifically targeted with a clear, focused and logical overall plan. Addressing asteroids can be accommodated but only as a byproduct of these main objectives. No doubt America has put itself in a highly restrictive financial position. However, if we do not clearly lay out visionary programs that build on the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, Apollo-Soyuz and Shuttle programs, we will remain in the doldrums into which we have retreated. Progress and necessary support comes only from vision and drive, not timidity and withdrawal. Looking into future exploration missions, Gibson has an opinion on what we should be doing now in order to eventual become an interstellar species. Gibson: To instill an overriding, long-term vision in our youth, general population and national leadership, we collectively have to create greater awareness of the bigger picture. When we got back and looked at what we had done travelled 35 million miles in 84 days we thought that we really had accomplished a lot. Then we got out the calculator and realized that it takes light just three minutes to go that same distance. Yet it takes light over four years just to reach our nearest star. So when it comes to REAL space travel, weve barely nudged the tip of our collective toe out the front door. I have no doubt that we will eventually travel out to other star systems. But that is many generations down
the road. I cant predict how we are going to work around the immense distances and the need to accelerate up close to the speed of light, but eventually that will happen. In the shorter term, weve got a whole solar system out there to explore. We need to focus on specific visionary programs and develop the capabilities to successfully perform them. I would first go back to the Moon, and then on to Mars. Mars appears to present a good opportunity for finding some form of life. Weve found water there and we
even better ones in the longer term. Eventually we will be able to image the details of planets around other stars. And if we do see one, a blue planet with an oxygen atmosphere, the pull would be irresistible! Were discovering planets all the time. Were bound to find some planets that have a potential for life which could have matured like it has here on Earth. There are bound to be many planets that are in their stars Goldilocks zone; that is, where it is not too hot, not too cold and free of excessive radiation and gravity. New
Scientist-astronaut Ed Gibson has just egressed the Skylab EVA hatchway during the final Photo: NASA Skylab Extravehicular Activity EVA which took place on February 3, 1974.
might also find some evidence of past or even present life. Much of these early explorations can best be done unmanned, as we are doing now, but ultimately its we who have to go there in person to see, feel and study this new turf up close. Then we should spread out to other bodies in our solar system. Were learning a great deal every day about other moons and planets. Again, the potential for life is one of the drawing cards. Also, the Hubble Space Telescope is a great observatory, but Id like to see the James Webb Telescope in operation and knowledge will always be a continuous draw. In fact, the more we learn, the more ignorant we realize we are. Recently we come to understand that what we thought was our total world is really at most five percent of the universe in which we are immersed. Dark matter and dark energy make up the remainder...unless theres more out there of which we are not yet aware. Theres a lot to do, a lot to learn and a lot to utilize. If we truly are a great nation, we will take our vision off our shoes and look to the horizon!
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Skylab Orbital Space Station as seen from the Skylab 2 Command Module during its initial fly around inspection. The cables and tubing seen on top of the orbital space station are all that remain of a solar panel that was completely ripped off during launch.
Photo: NASA via Retro Space Images
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The Skylab Space Station atop a Saturn V rocket is transported to Pad 39A in 1973.
Photo: NASA via Retro Space Images
the very future of the space station would hang by a thread. The Saturn flew its pre-programmed ascent profile, with the second stage taking over when the S-IC first stage burned out. The five J-2 engines of the S-II second stage were automatically commanded to burn for a little longer than normal in order to compensate for the additional weight. Within ten minutes of leaving the Cape, the S-II shut down crisply and the next milestone was for the instrument unit atop the workshop to ready Skylab for orbital operations. The shroud separated and then, at 1:47 p.m., electric motors rotated the giant Apollo Telescope Mount (ATM) out 90 degrees. After it had locked itself into place, the ATMs windmill of solar arrays was deployed. In the euphoria of those first few minutes, the mysterious piece of telemetry about the micrometeoroid shield and the workshops own solar arrays almost went unnoticed. Almost Within an hour of liftoff, Flight Director Don Puddy reported erratic signals. The main solar arrays should
have been deployed when Skylab passed beyond the Madrid tracking station in Spain. Tensions began to rise in Houston, as NASA managers listened for news from the tracking station, at Carnarvon in Western Australia. The data was confusing. Controllers expected that their monitors would show the two large solar panels fully deployed and producing about 12.4 kW, some 60 percent of the required electrical load. It was with surprise and dismay, therefore, that the data indicated that power levels were much, much lowerat a mere 25 watts, in fact! The Carnarvon data suggested that the arrays had released for deployment, but had not fully extended, whilst temperature signals from the workshop implied that one array had either been torn away or had suffered severe structural failure, whilst the other had been released, but had not properly deployed. The data from the next few orbits confirmed a failed micrometeoroid shield and a power outage owing to a solar array malfunction. These concerns were amplified later in the
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afternoon when telemetry pointed to an electrical short in the pyrotechnic relay needed to release the arrays. In Mission Control, off-duty flight director Phil Shaffer set to work implementing a malfunction list to handle the myriad problems which were now flooding in from Skylab. Puddy didnt have time for it, Shaffer related, in an interview quoted by David Hitt, Owen Garriott and Joe Kerwin in their book Homesteading Space. Within an hour or two of starting the list, Shaffer found that it already ran to nearly 50 mission-critical items! At that point, he continued, we stalled out on the post-insertion activation sequenceand stuff just kept failing and we could see it was beginning to get hot inside Skylab. It was certain that Charles Pete Conrad (Commander), Joe Kerwin (Science Pilot) and Paul Weitz (Pilot) would not be flying on 15 May and their launch was scrubbed within eight hours of Skylab reaching orbit. Based on the stations orbital geometry, launch opportunities occurred every five days and the mission was tentatively rescheduled for no earlier than 20 May. The astronauts flew back to Houston in their T-38 jets to develop a new flight plan, which called for a 17day nominal mission, then minimal activity for a further 11 days in order to gather the medical data for a full four-week residency. However, as this plan began to crystallise, the situation worsened. In order to produce electricity, Skylab needed to remain in a solar inertial attitude, with the Suns rays perpendicular to the ATM solar panels, but this exposed the full length of the workshop to excessive overheating. For a time, Mission Control limited the problem by pointing the front end of the station directly at the Sun. This lowered temperatures... but also reduced power levels. The best compromise, it was found, was for Skylab to be pitched upwards, about 45 degrees, towards the Sun. This permitted just enough sunlight to illuminate the ATM arrays and
charge their batteries for the next period of orbital darkness, whilst also stabilising internal temperatures at around 42C. Conversely, and somewhat ironically, temperatures in the airlock actually dropped precipitously and threatened to freeze heat exchangers and coolant loops by 18 May. Manoeuvres to warm the airlock succeeded, but at the expense of overheating the rest of the station. Therefore, the problem of maintaining this fine balance between temperature and power was extremely difficult. Although it was clear that some sort of repair was critical, there was one saving grace: not all of Sky-
labs exterior required protection. In fact, covering the part of the workshops exterior which directly faced the Sun would serve to bring temperatures within satisfactory limits and, furthermore, such a shade would not need to be tied down or composed of strong or rigid material. In the hours after the accident, options for developing this material were exhaustively brainstormed throughout NASA and the proposals came thick and fast, ranging from spray paints, inflatable balloons and wallpapers to window curtains and extending metal panels. At length, ten options were shortlisted for closer inspection, within
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the guidelines that they must be lightweight, fit inside the cabin of the command module for transportation and were fairly straightforward to deploy. These options were ultimately winnowed down into three finalists: (1) the extension of a sunshade across the exposed hull of the workshop, erected by means of a long pole affixed to the ATM, (2) a sunshade deployed from the command modules hatch whilst station-keeping or (3) a sunshade deployed through Skylabs solarfacing scientific airlock. Of these, Option 2 was the least technically complex, although its key obstacle was that Conrad, at the command modules controls, would be forced to hold position alongside the workshop, whilst his colleagues opened the hatch to put the sunshade in position. The first option to erect such a shield would require additional EVA training. The third option would require the development of a shade which was capable of passing through a 20 cm3 opening and then unfurling to cover an area of 7 m2. It also meant that the scientific airlock would have to be sacrificed. Conrads crew had already done extensive EVA training on the ATM and felt that with the availability of suitable hand-holds and foot restraints, they could complete Option 1. Similarly, Option 3 was also doable, because they could at least work from within the pressurised but very hot confines of the workshop itself. At length, since no one knew if the scientific airlocks were cluttered with debris, Option 3 was ranked last. Johnson Space Center set to work on Option 2, and the Marshall Space Flight Center explored Option 1. The Houston group envisaged a scenario in which an astronaut (probably Weitz) would perform a stand-up EVA (SEVA) in the open hatch of the command module and attach the sunshade in two places to the aft section of Skylab. Conrad would then manoeuvre his spacecraft to the forward end of the station, deploying the shade in the process and finally Weitz would
make a third attachment at the ATM. This sunshade very quickly gained the moniker of SEVA sail and its development was conducted under the auspices of Caldwell Johnson. For ten days, his staff worked on the shade, seamstresses stitched the orange material, parachute packers folded it for deployment, engineers attended to its various fastenersand a steady stream of public tours gawped from a mezzanine gallery at what was going on. Meanwhile, in Huntsville, the plan was to perform an EVA from the ATM itself. Their sunshade resembled a window blind and its design was completed on the evening of 15 May. Kerwin and the backup commander, Rusty Schweickart, flew to the Marshall Space Flight Center to participate in underwater EVA tests of both sunshades. One by one, recalled Schweickart of the exhaustive two-hourplus session, we eliminated things and by about midnightwe basically had the outlines of what we were going to do. The Huntsville sunshade needed further work and the design which steadily evolved was a configuration of two 14 m long poles, which would be cantilevered from the ATM. The poles would be assembled from a dozen smaller sections, allowing them to fit inside the command module, and a rope would run along their length, through a series of eyelets. The 7 x 6 m sunshade would be unfurled by tugging on the rope in a similar fashion to hoisting a ships sail. This design came to be known as the twin-pole sail. An underwater test by Schweickart and Kerwin on 18 May showed that it would work, but also indicated that its pole sections might separate under stress. A locking nut was modified, the shades weight was reduced and Teflon inserts were placed into the eyelets to reduce friction. Thereafter, the remainder of the work ran without a hitch. Meanwhile, the option to deploy a sunshade from the scientific airlock had been revived and was steadily gaining momentum, with
Skylab:
Skylab 1
The Skylab space station itself was launched into orbit on 14 May 1973. During ascent, one of the solar arrays was torn off, together with the micrometeoroid shield, and the second array was left jammed with debris. The launch of the first crew was delayed as NASA explored its options.
Skylab 2
The first crew to the space station consisted of Pete Conrad (Commander), Joe Kerwin (Science Pilot) and Paul Weitz (Pilot). They were launched into orbit on 25 May 1973 and spent 28 days at Skylab. During their mission, they performed a dangerous spacewalk to install a new sunshade and open the jammed solar array.
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a concept that came to be known as the parasol. Tests showed that a combination of coiled springs and telescoping rods could fit inside a standard airlock experiment canister and could be deployed smoothly. Jack Kinzler, chief of the Johnson Space Centers technical services division, a close friend and neighbour of Conrad, developed the system by jury-rigging it from a parachute canopy and telescoping glass-fibre fishing rods in hubmounted springs. During a final review at the Kennedy Space Center on 19 May, Kinzlers parasol was accepted as the primary method and on the 24th the flight readiness review endorsed it. Having an astronaut standing in the hatch on an EVA was undesirable, since it would come at the end of a long, 22-hour day for the crew. Equally, the twin-pole concept did not meet with the approval of the flight surgeons, who were aghast at the prospect of such a complex task so early in the mission, before the crew had properly acclimatised to weightlessness. However, Conrad felt that Kinzlers design was the simplest, safest and quickest methodand most likely to succeed. Years later, Schweickart glowingly praised the efforts of the industrial and NASA workforces to save Skylab during those frantic days of May 1973. I probably got a little bit of sleep, he recalled, but most of the team who worked with me at Huntsville never slept for four days! It was totally round-the-clock and it was not just the resources of the centre; it was all of the resources of the whole aerospace industry. Kerwin felt the same. It was a great team, he reflected. I look on Apollo 13 as the supreme test for the Mission Control team. The Skylab problem was the supreme test for the engineering team. Both the contractors and the civil servants joined together, as one, and they figured out what the problem was. Of course, the state of the arrays and the reason for the No. 2 array being unable to properly un-
Close up view of Skylab 2 Crewmember Joseph P. Kerwin performing an extravehicular Photo: NASA via Retro Space Images activity (EVA), probably to repair the covering.
furl, could only be speculated until the arrival of Conrads crew and the presence of three sets of eyes to physically see what was amiss. If debris was the problem, a repair method was acutely needed and engineers from the Marshall Space Flight Center set to work to adapt a cable cutter (not dissimilar to a heavy-duty tree lopper) and a universal tool with prongs for prying and pulling to open the jammed array. On 19 May, the tools were successfully tested in Marshalls neutral buoyancy tank, with the Skylab mockup specially modified with fragments of metal wire bundles, shards of bolts and other objects representative of a failed micrometeoroid shield. Conrad, Kerwin and Weitz took their turns underwater, evaluating the tools, practicing prying the debris away from the array and completing the whole procedure safely. The tools had already left for the Kennedy Space Center when a certification review ruled that the pointed tips of the cutter were hazardous. New heads with blunt tips were quickly prepared and the change was made at the launch site. Now, however, the time for talking was over. Years later, in her book Rocketman, Nancy Conrad related that Petes response to the seemingly endless testing was typically to the point: Just get me up there! With their launch scheduled for the stroke of 9:00 a.m. EST, the morning of 25 May 1973 was particularly peaceful for the three astronauts. This was the least well-attended Apollo launch in history, Kerwin recalled, because everybody had to go home and put the kids back in school. We arrived at the command module and looked inside and it was a sea of brown rope under the seats and under the brown
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ropes were all these different umbrellas and parasols and sails and also the equipment that we had selected to try and free up the solar panel, which was a pretty eclectic collection of aluminium poles that could be connected together, and a Southwestern Bell Telephone Company tree-lopper with brown ropes to open and close the jaws. They handed us the checklist and said This is how to operate that stuff. Some of it wed seen, some of it we hadnt! The astronauts were unperturbed. Indeed, as their Saturn IB rocket cleared the Pad 39B tower and roared into the clear morning sky, Conrad declared that his crew could fix anything. Launch was on time and kicked off an eight-hour orbital ballet to rendezvous with the crippled station. Conrads call of Tally-ho the Skylab! as a steadily brightening star on the horizon drew closer masked, at first, the seriousness of what the astronauts were about to face. The micrometeoroid shield was
indeed gone, as was one of the two solar arrays, whilst the second was jammed by debris. As Weitz took pictures, Conrad performed a flyaround inspection, quickly ascertaining that the scientific airlock was not cluttered with debris, thereby making the deployment of the Houston parasol a realistic option, and asserting his conviction that a stand-up EVA with the cutter should be enough to free the jammed solar array. The first order of business was a soft docking at Skylabs forward port, engaging capture latches but not retracting the command modules docking probe to ensure a firm metallic embrace. After a quick lunch, Conrad undocked from Skylab, depressurised the cabin and opened the side hatch. With Kerwin hanging onto his ankles for stability, Weitz tried to use the modified tree loppers and a kind of shepherds crook to free the jammed array. Unfortunately, despite his sterling efforts, it did not go well. At first, Weitz positioned himself with his upper body poking through the hatch into the ethereal blackness of space. Kerwin passed him three sections to assemble a 4.5 m pole with the loppers on the end, whilst Conrad kept the spacecraft steady. We had seenthat there was a piece of bolted L-sections from the thermal shield that had been wrapped up around the top of the solar wing, Weitz recalled, and apparently the bolt heads were driven into the aluminium skin. We thought maybe wed just break it loose, so we got down near the end of the solar array and I got a hold of it with the shepherds crook. What we really hadnt thought about was in heaving on it, trying to break the thing free what I was doing, in effect, was pulling the command module in towards the workshop. Weitz could quickly ascertain that he was physically moving Skylab, because its thrusters were spitting and spurting to maintain its attitude and correct the oscillations. Meanwhile, Conrad had the un-
Skylab Rescue
When a problem was found with the Skylab 3 crews spacecraft, a second craft was hurriedly prepared on the ground to rescue them if needed. Astronauts Vance Brand (Commander) and Don Lind (Pilot) were trained to fly a five-seater Apollo to dock with Skylab and bring Bean, Garriott and Lousma home. As circumstances transpired, the problem was steadily resolved and the rescue mission became unnecessary.
Skylab 4
The third and final crew of Jerry Carr (Commander), Ed Gibson (Science Pilot) and Bill Pogue (Pilot) were launched on 16 November 1973 and spent 84 days aboard Skylab. This was a world endurance record which lasted until 1978. Despite early incidents of space sickness and an overly ambitious schedule, which left the crew overworked
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enviable task of keeping the spacecraft as close as just 60 cm from the station, whilst at the same time trying to prevent the unwanted oscillations from causing a collision. His task was compounded by the fact that a third of his field of view was blocked by the command modules open hatch. It made for some dicey times, Weitz recalled. As the two vehicles entered orbital darkness, he paused in his work, then resumed as they flew within range of the tracking station. The shepherds crook was getting him nowhere and the torrent of fourletter words from all three members of the crew even prompted the capcom to advise them to modify their language; for they were on an open mike. The main problem, Conrad told the ground, was that a strip of metal had become wrapped across the solar array system during the separation of the micrometeoroid shield. Its metal bolts had tangled themselves in the array, thereby jamming it, and none of Weitz actions to cut the strap, even with the loppers, were having any effect. Rather than cutting it across the short way, we were trying to cut along the long way, Weitz explained, and just didnt have enough muscle with that thing, because it was six or eight feet out ahead of me and I was pulling on a line to try to do it. The metal strap, ironically, was only a few centimetres wide, but it was riveted fast and Conrad knew they did not have a hope of breaking it using the tools in the command module. The attempt was called off and after 40 minutes or so the astronauts were instructed to close the hatch and re-dock with Skylab. On their first attempt to dock, the probe did not engage with the drogue and no fewer than three further attempts were also fruitless. Pete gave Weitz the controls, Nancy Conrad wrote, depressurised the command module and opened the tunnel hatch. He and Joe dove head-first into the bank of circuits and gizmos, Pete cussing
A view of the repaired Skylab Space Station cluster in Earth orbit as photographed from the Skylab 4 Command and Service Modules (CSM) during the final fly-around by the CSM before returning home. The space station is contrasted against a cloud-covered Earth. Photo: NASA via Retro Space Images
a blue streak as he sorted through wires, cutting and splicing like [an angry] Maytag repairman trying to get a dryer to work again. After an hour or so of re-routing and connecting wires, bypassing electrical relays for the capture latches on the tip of the probe, skinning knuckles and a handful of undesirable vocabulary, Conrad used the service modules thrusters to bring the two collars into direct contact, mechanically triggering the dozen capture latches. They were at Skylab to stay. Next morning, the crew opened the hatch into the multiple docking adaptor and Weitz was the first to enter Skylab. Pressure checks were quickly followed by air sampling to test for the presence of noxious toluene and carbon monoxide, both of which gave the workshops atmosphere a clean bill of health. At length, after several hours, the parasol was assembled and at 7:30 p.m. its rods were delicately threaded through the scientific airlock into vacuum. Next, the parasol itself emerged, folding out like a big patio umbrella. However, all was not right: one
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of its four folded arms did not swing out properly and Kerwin expressed dismay when he saw it had only deployed to cover two-thirds of its required area. Its not laid out the way its supposed to be, a dejected Conrad told Mission Control, as it became clear that the parasol was askew and somewhat crinkled. Nevertheless, the ground team in Houston assured the astronauts that the wrinkles had probably set in during the coldness of the lengthy deployment, which took place during orbital night-time, and, as the material heated up in sunlight, it would spread out fully. I think the ground noticed the temperatures coming down, Weitz recalled. Within an hour, they could tell. Indeed, overnight on 26/27 May, the temperature on the exterior of the workshop dropped by 55C and its interior by 11C. Eventually, the interior temperature stabilised at around 30C. However, for the mission to survive and succeed, it was necessary to release the jammed array, and soon, and plans were set in motion for an EVA on 7 June. Since the airlock was right in the middle of the Skylab cluster, with the hatch to the workshop at its aft end and a hatch to the stations multiple docking adaptor and the command module at its forward end, a fully-suited Weitz had to make sure that Conrad and Kerwin had all of their tools and tethers before he depressurised them. Weitz then retreated into the multiple docking adaptor. The hatch was opened at 10:23 a.m., just before the workshop entered the dark portion of its orbit. Conrad assembled the tools six 1.5 m rods were screwed together, the cable cutter was fitted and several metres of rope from the backup SEVA sail were tied to the cutters pull rope and then he and Kerwin moved into position alongside the antenna boom. The unlikely contraption thus enabled them to operate the cutter from 8-9 m away just far enough from the airlock to the jammed array. As Kerwin tried to close the cut-
ters against the debris, it became apparent that he was slipping, because he was unable to establish a secure position for himself. For half an hour or more, with one hand steadying himself and the other trying to close the cutters, he struggled fruitlessly to complete the work. As his pulse rate began to climb, he decided on an alternative course of action and shortened his own tether, in an effort to steady himself against the edge of the workshop. It worked and after ten minutes or so he was able to tell ground controllers in Houston that the cutters were now securely fastened to the debris. Next, he pulled on the lanyard to operate them and nothing happened. Conrad made his way, handover-hand, along the length of the beam to see what was amiss, and precisely as he reached the cutter end, the jaws snapped shut, freeing some of the metal strap at 2:01 p.m. and hurling the commander into space. Fortunately, his tether restrained him from moving far from Skylab, and the jammed array now stood at 20-degrees-open. The frozen damper, however, still resisted normal deployment and the holes on the solar array were smaller than on the ground model. The two men heaved, without success, until Conrad placed his feet on the frozen hinge, stooped to fit the tether over his shoulder and stood up. Kerwin pulled on the tether and, this time, the solar array suddenly released and sprang into its full, 90-degrees-open position. Both astronauts were flung outwards by the catapult-like effect and arrested by their tethers. Inside Skylab, the needles of the electricity meters dramatically jumped, signalling success. By the next day, 8 June, solar heating had fully extended the array and it was generating no less than 7 kW of much-needed power. From just 40 percent power, the stations output suddenly increased to around 70 percent. Against all the odds, Skylabs fortunes had been snatched from the gaping jaws of defeat. The mission was underway.
MISSIONS
to the point of exhaustion, the mission was enormously successful, performing observations of Comet Kohoutek and several spacewalks.
Skylab 5
At one stage, it was possible that a fourth crew of Vance Brand (Commander), Bill Lenoir (Science Pilot) and Don Lind (Pilot) may have flown a short, 21-day mission to finish up some final experiments aboard Skylab. However, when Skylab 4 was extended from 56 to 84 days, this mission became unnecessary.
STS-3
One of the early plans for the Shuttle was to visit and re-boost Skylab into a higher orbit. On the third Shuttle mission, astronauts Fred Haise (Commander) and Jack Lousma (Pilot) would have transported a system to dock with Skylab and save it from a fiery re-entry. It was hoped that the Shuttle might enable a new series of Skylab missions in the 1980s. However, solar activity caused Skylab to descend to Earth faster than expected, the Shuttle was delayed and the mission was cancelled. Skylab burned up in the atmosphere in July 1979.
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nyone who has witnessed a Space Shuttle or rocket launch in person from Cape Canaveral, Florida has probably seen the Pave Hawk helicopters patrolling up and down the coast in the hours before launch. The airmen onboard serve a critical role for every launch - providing safety and security surveillance to the Eastern Launch Range. Simply put, if they do not secure the range, rockets do not launch. The 920th Rescue Wing, based out of Patrick Air Force Base, serves as an Air Force Reserve Command combat-search-and-rescue unit. They are responsible for a variety of demanding missions, ready to deploy at a moments notice, and trained to perform some of the most highly specialized operations in the Air Force. They were the primary rescue force serving as guardians of the astronauts for 50 years, providing contingency response for a variety of emergencies that could potentially come up during a Space Shuttle launch or landing. These airmen and their elite team of Pararescuemen, known as PJs, are among the most highly trained emergency trauma specialists in the U.S. military, capable of performing life-saving missions anywhere in the world, at any time. In addition to combat search and rescue operations, the 920th also provides search and rescue support for civilians at sea who are lost or in distress, as well as providing worldwide humanitarian and disasterrelief operations supporting rescue efforts in the aftermath of disasters such as earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes. When a covert four-man Navy SEAL team was ambushed and surrounded in a Taliban counter attack high in the Hindu Kush mountains of Afghanistan in the summer of 2005, the 920th is who they called for rescue. In the spring of 2012, I was invited by the 920th to fly along on a range-clearing mission to support the historic launch of the first SpaceX Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station. The mission, known as COTS-2, was the first to see a commercial company deliver supplies to the orbiting outpost, which orbits some 250 miles above Earth. No photojournalist had ever flown with the 920th for any launch since they
Originally produced by Mike Killian for ARES Institutes Zero-G News. All photography by Mike Killian.
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Seen through a pair of Air Force issued night-vision goggles, 920th Rescue Wing Airmen prepare to take to the skies to secure the Eastern Range in support of the SpaceX COTS-2 launch.
began supporting the U.S. Space Program in 1961, I was the first, and I was very humbled for the opportunity. Although Americas human spaceflight program is currently 100% dependent on Russia since the retirement of NASAs Space Shuttle program, the 920ths role supporting unmanned rocket launches from the Cape is still as active, and as important, as it has ever been. bullet holes from their tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, a sobering reminder of the reality of their jobs as combatsearch-and-rescue airmen. I arrived at Patrick AFB at 12:30 a.m. May 19 for our flight supporting the first launch attempt. After security checks, I proceeded to go meet the crew and conduct the standard pre-flight briefing. The briefing is incredibly thorough, nothing is missed, everything from contingency plans in case of an emergency, to radio frequencies, to the positions of both Pave Hawks at launch time is covered. Both Pave Hawk crews were also brought up to speed on the launch itself and the details of the COTS-2 mission, and they were not shy about showing their excitement for a one-second launch window as opposed to a typical two- or three-hour launch window. Our Pave Hawk would patrol north of the launch site, call sign Jolly 1. The other (Jolly 2) would patrol to the south of the launch site. Once everyone was briefed it was time to put on our flight gear and life support equipment. The building where we geared up, at first glance, resembles a locker room at any gym, except instead of football helmets and dirty socks there are night vision goggles, parachutes, flight helmets and headsets, inflatable military life preservers, and probably a few pairs of dirty socks. We geared up and made sure our headsets
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worked properly, then walked to the flight line, where assignment on the other side of the country, but two of Patricks 14 Pave Hawks were being prepared was already looking forward to my flight for launch for our mission. attempt number two. After talking with the crew and going over emergency scenarios, such as learning how to safely bail out of a Pave Hawk, the APUs started and the choppers came alive. Our pilot was Colonel Jeffrey SKINNY Macrander, who just so happens to be the Commander of the 920th Rescue Wing - responsible for I returned Monday night, May 21, at 10:30 p.m. to the management and supervision of some 1,700 citizen airmen under his command. A veteran of Operations do it all over again, but this time with Lt. Colonel Rob Allied Force, Northern Watch, Noble Eagle, Southern Haston piloting our Pave Hawk. Lt. Colonel Haston has Watch and Operation Enduring Freedom, Colonel been supporting rocket launches for nearly twenty Macrander is a rated command pilot and has over years, piloting Pave Hawks and clearing the range for 4,500 hours of flight time in five different military aircraft. nearly every launch since 1995 - including Space Shuttle He was also part of the crew who rescued ambushed launches and landings. He has witnessed three rockets explode, so he understands first hand the importance Navy SEALS in the Afghan mountains in 2005. They usually like us to clear the box about two hours prior to launch. Since it is 2:00 a.m. we dont expect a whole lot of small boats out there, but we still get the commercial traffic that cruises back and forth, said Col. Macrander minutes before our flight. The big boats are always up on a maritime frequency, so we have a special radio in the Pave Hawk to call and talk to the boats. Well tell them to either speed up, change their course, or slow down so that they are not in the range for the launch window. Well call the coordinates into the control office at the Cape and they will plot it, do some math, and let us know what the boaters need to do to stay out of the range. A lot of times the small boats are just fishing and not monitoring their Pave Hawk Jolly 1 preparing to take to the skies to clear the Eastern Range in support radios, so sometimes we have of the SpaceX Falcon 9 COTS-2 launch. to come down there and hover pretty close to get their attention and let them know of the 920ths role in securing the Eastern Range for a launch. with hand gestures to get on the radio. I liken supporting rocket launches to fishing. There I would find out later that evening just how close they get to those small fishing boats not paying attention are a lot of nuances to range clearing that Ive experienced over the to their radios. We even hovered years, said Lt. Col. within 200 feet of a boater who Haston. You get to was sound asleep, using the noise know the type of boats from the rotors and flashing bright and generally where spotlights on his boat to wake him they are going. A lot up. I can only imagine his reaction, of different skills are waking up to an Air Force Pave involved depending Lt. Colonel Rob Haston Hawk circling him in the middle of on the type of boats the night. you are dealing with. You may be dealing with a 1,000As for the launch, it scrubbed 0.5 seconds before foot freighter with a non-English speaking captain, liftoff. A second launch attempt was scheduled for or a brand new boat owner in a sailboat. Lt. Col. three days later. In the meantime I had a different
Dragons Breath
I liken supporting rocket launches to fishing. There are a lot of nuances to range clearing.
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Pre-flight briefing for our mission to clear the Eastern Range of unwanted guests for the SpaceX COTS-2 launch.
920th Rescue Wing Airmen ready a HH-60G Pave Hawk to fly our range-clearing mission.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket ignites to send their Dragon spacecraft on the first commercial spaceflight to the International Space Station, as shot from a 920th Rescue Wing Pave Hawk helicopter - call sign Jolly 1.
Hastons unique experience supporting launches is, as he put it, not the sort of thing you pick up in Air Force regulations, but rather tricks of the trade. We went through the same routine as we did for the first launch attempt, but this time the crew gave me a pair of night-vision goggles so I could see what they see and shoot some photos to give viewers their perspective. The night vision goggles help amplify the available light from the Moon and stars by up to 5,000 times onto a green phosphorous screen; the human eye can distinguish more shades of green than any other color. There was no moon this night, and even 60 miles out over the ocean in the darkest black I have ever seen, the goggles illuminated everything, I could even see the ripple of waves on the oceans surface. We took to the skies two hours before launch, heading up the coast of Brevard County towards Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, where SpaceX Launch Complex 40 and their Falcon 9 rocket stood fully fueled. We hovered a short distance away from the rocket for a few minutes, allowing me to shoot some exclusive photos from our unique vantage point before heading out to sea to clear boat traffic off the range. Our orders were to clear an area about 20 miles wide and 60 miles long around the launch site. They (range control) want us to clear 8-10 miles away from the azimuth. With a small rocket like this, its a small box, but because its brand new we need to keep it pretty clear, said Lt. Col. Haston. The night was fairly quiet, there was not much boat traffic getting in the way, but it was interesting to come within a couple hundred feet of a Carnival cruise ship and tell them to hurry up and get into Port Canaveral before the launch. I can only imagine the surprise people onboard must have felt when they saw, or heard, us circling overhead. Lights go off in the Pave Hawk during night-ops. Small fluorescent tubes reference our emergency exits, and the cockpit controls and displays - as well as the LCD screens on our cameras and cell phones - were the only lights we had. The pitch black view 60 miles out over the Atlantic allowed the Milky Way to shine brightly in the sky, and the sound of our rotors with no visual of anything was very strange, even eerie. At one point I lost all reference of direction and could not even see the camera gear I had strapped to me. Eventually the lights of Floridas Space Coast began to shine, and the unmistakeable sight of xenon lights on the Falcon 9 rocket came back into view. Even from 30 miles out, on a dark moonless night, NASAs massive Vehicle Assembly Building stood out like a sore thumb many of my friends and colleagues were on the roof to cover the historic launch. We arrived at the shoreline north of Kennedy Space Center about 20 minutes before launch, at which point we headed south along the beach, over Apollo/Shuttle launch pads 39B and 39A before hovering one final time next to the Falcon 9 for some last minute photos. We then proceeded to fly over KSC, at which point Lt.
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Col. Haston brought us over to the VAB, circling it from the back and bringing us within throwing distance of the rooftop and the press site. I could see some of the press corps flashing lights at us, their way of saying hello - we were close enough that I could see the light from the LCD screens on their cameras. We positioned ourselves just north of the VAB and hovered with a great view of Falcon 9 out the left side of our Pave Hawk. We listened to the launch commentary on our headsets and watched in awe as the Falcon 9 roared to life under cover of darkness. The power of its nine Merlin engines turned night into day and the entire landscape of Kennedy Space Center lit up. The rocket and its Dragon spacecraft accelerated quickly through the atmosphere, vanishing as it climbed above the Pave Hawks rotors and out of view, at which point Lt. Col. Haston tilted us up so I could get in a few more shots. We then circled to try and position ourselves for another view, but by that time the rocket was already gone, still visible, but already on the edge of space en route to the International Space Station.
Shortly before lights out as we took to the skies over Floridas Space Coast to clear the Eastern Range for the SpaceX COTS-2 launch.
Night vision displays green because the human eye can distinguish more shades of green than any other color.
With that, our mission was complete, and we headed south back to Patrick. As we approached Port Canaveral, the first stage of the Falcon 9 was already re-entering the Earths atmosphere, shining as bright as a comet as it plunged back to Earth. Upon reaching the Port, Lt. Col. Haston decided to show me a little more of what the Pave Hawk could do, performing some maneuvers that most would describe as a roller coaster ride over Port Canaveral. Im sure some of the folks on the ground wondered why a Pave Hawk was going crazy in the sky, but it sure was fun. Day launches are my preference as you encounter wildlife from the aircraft. You can see various fish, turtles and dolphins, and the occasional whale while flying over the wide open ocean, said Lt. Col. Haston. But supporting any landmark launch, like this one, is always a great thing to be a part of. Landing at Patrick was the end of my day, or night, depending on how you look at it. But for the crews I flew with, it was just the beginning, as they were getting ready to perform a search-and-rescue operation for a ship 1,200 miles off the coast of Florida in the area of Bermuda. Their motto, These things we do, that others may live is a way of life for the men and women of the 920th Rescue Wing, and I am honored to have flown with them, twice, to cover a launch which marked a pivotal turning point for Americas space program. For more information on the 920th Rescue Wing, visit their website: www.920rqw.afrc.af.mil or follow them on Facebook: www.facebook.com/920thRescueWing.
Ignition of the Falcon 9s nine Merlin engines as seen from aboard the Pave Hawk.
A 920th Rescue Wing Airmen, fully equipped with night-vision goggles, spies the surroundings only seconds before takeoff.
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Yuris Night:
Yuris Night: Through the years. Photos (from top, left to right): NASA, Kris Amundson, Rdio Zero (flickr.com), Chase Clark, Scott Ashkenaz, Morten Arstad,
NASA, J.L. Pickering, Chase Clark, Rdio Zero (flickr.com), Michael Wright, Scott Beale, Loretta Hidalgo Whitesides, Ethan Hurdus, and Braden Kowitz.
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uman exploration of space began more than a half century ago with the launch of Vostok 1 on April 12, 1961. The small capsule carried cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first human to leave the bonds of Earth and enter space. Exactly 20 years later, the United States began a new era in spaceflight with the inaugural launch of the Space Shuttle. Twenty years after that, an annual celebration of our exploration of space began by connecting thousands of people around the world to celebrate past accomplishments and to inspire a new generation. That event is Yuris Night. Every year on April 12, Yuris Night brings the excitement and promise of space travel closer to people of all ages and all nationalities.
Chris Welch was on BBC Radio, and George was on both NPRs Morning Edition and MTVs Mandy Moore Summer Special where he was highlighted as a good guy for his efforts to bring the planet together to dance for space. After the party, young people from the LA club scene told us it was the best party they had been to and thanked us for creating such an awesome space. Young engineers from JPL stopped and told us it was the most fun they had had out in a long time. We succeeded in doing what we had set out to do bring together the people who really work for space with the people who think space is cool and want to be a part of it.
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Authored by Amy Shira Teitel, an expanded version of this article appears on her Vintage Space blog. Photos are courtesy of Retro Space Images.
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ground tracking station asked how he was doing, he would inquire as to their well being as well. His speech on the launch pad, however, is a myth perpetuated by Soviet media. The snippets of stirring speeches heard over the radio were pieced together from a previous speech Gagarin had been told to read to an audience in Moscow months prior. The words came from an anonymous speechwriter. Not everyone was calm, however. Chief Designer Sergei Korolev was so anxious the morning of the launch that he took tranquilizers to calm himself. His confidence in his own system had been badly shaken by the relatively high failure rate of the Korabl launch vehicle, particularly its third stage. The flight itself was also far more problematic than the Soviet space program was willing to admit. The third stage didnt fail as catastrophically as Korolev feared, but it didnt perform perfectly either. Gagarins orbit was higher than intended, making the already all-important reentry that much more important. With a high orbit, a missed retrofire would necessarily extend the mission beyond what the space program had trained for. The higher-than-intended orbit turned out to be an innocuous problem. As the space program was wont to express, Gagarin landed safely and on target. It would turn out that this wasnt the case either. Not only did Gagarin not land on target, he didnt land inside the capsule. He ejected from his Vostok 1 and landed softly with his own parachute. Gagarins off-target landing was the result of the only major malfunction in the mission. Just after the retrofire burn during the early reentry and early descent, Vostok 1 began to roll. It got worse when the instrument unit failed to separate from the descent portion of the spacecraft. A series of cables failed to sever completely, keeping the two portions linked. They eventually separated ten minutes later when the heat from atmospheric reentry
burned through them. Gagarin was spared a tumbling reentry. Vostoks main chute was also late to deploy, forcing Gagarin to eject from the capsule early. He separated from his ejection seat and opened his own parachute. Vostoks chute did eventually open. The cosmonaut landed ten minutes after and miles away from his capsule in the Saratova, a region of Soviet Union not far from the border with Kazakhstan. He touched down on rural farmland, startling curious onlookers with his spacesuit and helmet. Gagarins true descent method, which makes it abundantly clear
orbited the Earth was certainly incontrovertible evidence of a flight in space, but the Soviet Union wanted to be sure their flight met the necessary guidelines. The question of pilot control was another fabricated part of the story. Reports praised Gagarin for his perfect flight, but in fact he didnt pilot the Vostok capsule. The capsules controls were locked; only a pre-determined sixdigit code could unlock to control when entered into a special onboard logic clock. The pilot was only told the first three digits. If he lost contact with the ground or
Yuri Gagarin entered the history books as the first man to reach outer space, although his flight did not go as perfectly as was reported by the Russian media at the time.
that Gagarin didnt land inside his capsule, wasnt revealed until 1971. The Soviets deliberate veiling of this fact was done in an attempt to secure a formal record of the accomplishment. The Fdration Aronautique Internationale, a French organization established in 1905 to maintain all records of accomplishments in aviation, had grown to include aeronautic and astronautic in the 1950s. Knowing the Soviets and the Americans intended to put a man in space, the FAI set the standard for what would constitute spaceflight. One of the conditions was that the pilot control the vehicle and land inside it. The fact that Gagarin had if he was in danger and needed to control the capsule to save his life and the mission, he could open a sealed envelope that contained the missing digits. Without forcibly unlocking the controls, the capsule would be entirely controlled either by its automatic systems of by the ground. Gagarin didnt open the sealed envelope. In spite of its less sophisticated technologies and totalitarian system, the fact remains that the Soviet Union put a man into orbit first. The Soviets continued both their veiled ways and fast-paced accomplishments into the 1960s, only overtaken by the Americans midway through 1965.
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Teach Briefs
NASA holding space settlement design contest
Design a space settlement! Space settlements are permanent communities in orbit, as opposed to a place to work for a few months and go home. Designing a space settlement involves physics, mathematics, space science, environmental science and many other disciplines. The NASA Space Settlement Design Contest is for K-12 students throughout in the world. Individuals or teams may enter. Grade levels are judged separately, except for the grand prize. Submissions must be received by March 15, 2014. For more information about the NASA Space Settlement Design Contest, visit http://settlement.arc. nasa.gov/Contest/. If you have any questions about the contest, please email Al Globus at aglobus@mail.arc.nasa.gov.
gain tools to help address common student misconceptions about the Moon, interact with lunar scientists and engineers, work with LRO data and learn how to bring these data and information to their students using hands-on activities aligned with grades 6-9 National Science Education Standards and Benchmarks. Workshops will take place: June 24-28 and July 8-12, 2013, at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Workshop participants will have the opportunity to tour the LRO Mission Operation Center and the Goddard spacecraft testing facilities. Each workshop will be limited to 25 participants. Interested educators are encouraged to apply early to secure a spot. For more information and to register for the workshops, visit http://lunar.gsfc.nasa.gov/lwe/index.html. Questions about these workshops should be directed to Katie Hessen at Katie.K.Hessen@nasa.gov.
of scientific research facilities and interaction with lunar scientists will also take place during the institute. The Unknown Moon Institute takes place June 24-28, 2013, in Laurel, Md. Registration is free, and applications are considered on a first-come, first-served basis. For more information and to apply for the institute, visit http://www. lpi.usra.edu/education/workshops/ unknownMoon/. Questions about this opportunity should be directed to Christine Shupla at shupla@lpi.usra.edu.
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roughly analogous to methods actually used in weather forecasting. Finally, the precipitation from each cloud is released, and the students will compare their estimates to what is actually experienced on the ground. Precipitation in this activity is represented by colored chocolate candies, which may help to keep the students attention! Find the activity in PDF format at http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/classroom-activities/#cloudcontent.
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Publ i c Sa fe t y Spinoffs
ASA has a long history of nding applications of space and aeronautics technologies that provide broad public benets. The basis for the Agencys direction to do this can be directly traced to the National Aeronautics and Space Act that created NASA in 1958. Since that initial call to action, NASAs emphasis on safety has translated not just to its rocket launches and laboratory practices, but also to innovations that improve our everyday lives, protecting the public and making us safer by supporting emergency responders, providing for people in crisis situations, detecting biological and chemical threats, and enhancing national security efforts at home and abroad.
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spinoff.nasa.gov For more information about NASA spinoffs, please visit spinoff.nasa.gov .
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Look up, down, left, right, and even diagonally, for words from this months issue.
K X Q R A L O S N N S E K Z S D A R Z H
M E Q F T D B E M U A V P K A D P O S N V P C U O E L S M R T E E M T N T L J S S Y E W A O I T A I M O D I N D G M O N T U G S R S A O V U R A M L S T S P A C L U B E N X W O F A E F M Y I Z E L Z L
E C Q M G A E Q B D F O U K N E E O R J
U F U U E C B L T A K L Y T D X N N O K
R R V R N U A B D R Q L U C R O S Q N P
Abby Apollo Astronaut Bean Black Hole Carr Clouds Columbia Conrad
Green Bank Launch Lockman Mars Moon Musk Nebula Opportunity Orion
Solar Soyuz SpaceX Spirit Stars STEM Sun Telescope Yuri www.RocketSTEM.org
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Space Briefs
The first stage of the privately developed Antares rocket stands erect at newly constructed Launch Pad 0-A at NASAs Wallops Flight Facility. The maiden Antares test launch is scheduled for mid-April 2013. Photo: Ken Kremer
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Space Briefs
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black hole
noun
a region of space having a gravitational field so intense that no matter or radiation can escape.
Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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Space Briefs
A window into Europas ocean may be right at the surface
Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech
If you could lick the surface of Jupiters icy moon Europa, you would actually be sampling a bit of the ocean beneath. Mike Brown, an astronomer at the California Institute of Technology, and Kevin Hand from NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory, have detailed the strongest evidence yet that salty water from the vast liquid ocean beneath Europas frozen exterior actually makes its way to the surface. The finding, based on some of the best data of its kind since NASAs Galileo mission (1989 to 2003) to study Jupiter and its moons, suggests there is a chemical exchange between the ocean and surface,
making the ocean a richer chemical environment. The exchange between the ocean and the surface, Brown said, means that energy might be going into the ocean, which is important in terms of the possibilities for life there. It also means that if youd like to know whats in the ocean, you can just go to the surface and scrape some off. Europas ocean is thought to cover the moons whole globe and is about 60 miles (100 kilometers) thick under a thin ice shell. Since the days of NASAs Voyager and Galileo missions, scientists have debated the composition of Europas surface.
The authors believe the composition of Europas ocean may closely resemble the salty ocean of Earth. Europa is considered a premier target in the search for life beyond Earth. A NASA-funded study team led by JPL and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, has been working with the scientific community to identify options to explore Europa further. If weve learned anything about life on Earth, its that where theres liquid water, theres generally life, Hand said. And of course our ocean is a nice, salty ocean. Perhaps Europas salty ocean is also a wonderful place for life.
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This map shows the oldest light in our universe, as detected with by the Planck mission. The ancient light, called the cosmic microwave background, was imprinted on the sky when the universe was 370,000 years old. It shows tiny temperature fluctuations that correspond to regions of slightly different densities, representing the seeds of the stars and galaxies of today. Image: ESA and the Planck Collaboration
and improve the accuracy of this model. At the same time, some curious features are observed that dont quite fit with the simple picture. For example, the model assumes the sky is the same everywhere, but the light patterns are asymmetrical, and there is a spot extending over a patch of sky that is larger than expected. On one hand, we have a simple model that fits our observations extremely well, but on the other hand, we see some strange features which force us to rethink some of our basic assumptions, said Jan Tauber, the European Space Agencys Planck project scientist based in the Netherlands. This is the beginning of a new journey, and we expect our continued analysis of Planck data will help shed light on this conundrum.
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Image: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech
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exoplanet
noun
a planet that orbits a star outside the solar system.
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use your help. There is the Sponsor a Shuttle Tile Program. You can have your name displayed on a shuttle tile. Or you could donate to EndeavourLA. Or do something as simple as becoming a member of the CSC. Becoming a member gets you free IMAX tickets, free parking, High-Wire bike rides, wall cliff climbs as well as much more. All things that are more fun than Disneyland, and still cheaper. Hey kids, if you want to make your parents happy, save them some money. A trip to Disneyland for the day, for a family of four - $334 just to get into the park. And its an additional $152 if you want to go to California Adventure on the same day, for which no one has the stamina. Not even kids.
The California Science Center, for a family of four $0.00. And if you want a second location, walk down the sidewalk about a hundred feet and you are at the Natural History Museum for half of what it would cost for a single ticket to get into Disneyland. What kid doesnt like dinosaurs? No kid I want to ever meet. So you can go to Disneyland and spend a lot more money, learn nothing, and enjoy the two hour drive home after a long day, or you can visit downtown LA, spend practically nothing, learn while having fun and possibly be inspired by the world of science. No one ever changed the world by riding through the Haunted Mansion.
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April 12, 1981: Space Shuttle Columbia launched this day from the LC-39A pad at Kennedy Space Center in
Florida. The STS-1 mission lasted just two days, circling the Earth 37 times, before landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Columbia carried a crew of two mission commander John W. Young and pilot Robert L. Crippen. It was the first American manned space flight since the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in July of 1975, and also marked the only time a maiden test flight of a new U.S. spacecraft system carried a human crew.